


One Call Away

by readysetstarker



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern: No Powers, Anal Fingering, Daddy Kink, Dirty Talk, Dom/sub Undertones, M/M, Masturbation, Peter Parker is 19, Phone Sex, Phone Sex Operator Tony Stark, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-09
Updated: 2020-02-04
Packaged: 2020-10-13 08:55:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20579843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/readysetstarker/pseuds/readysetstarker
Summary: Tony didn’tneedthe phone sex gig. He was more than well off, his own sex life was in great shape, but damn, there was just something about listening to someone else get off to his voice. Tony had always loved hearing himself talk if he was being completely honest, so hearing someone else enjoy his voice as much as he did was a hell of an ego boost.So he did it on nights when he was bored, opening up an extra line specifically for those types of calls. He poured himself a generous glass of bourbon, set some mood music in the background for any caller looking for the full experience, and palmed himself lazily through his jeans on each call.tumblr prompt fill





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this started as a prompt fill on tumblr and spiraled into.... smth else entirely. a bunch of people asked me to post this on ao3, and one of these days i might take the anon mask off. for now, though, i'm still not brave enough to show off my original account, lol. so, for everyone wanting these parts all in one place, here you go! y'all can find me on my tumblr mentioned below. hate is gonna be ignored and deleted, so like, do smth more productive instead.
> 
> everyone is of legal age, btw.
> 
> **prompt from tumblr:** still accepting prompts? what about some nice starker virginity kink with a dash of daddy kink and pet names

Tony didn’t _need_ the phone sex gig. He was more than well off, his own sex life was in great shape, but damn, there was just something about listening to someone else get off to his voice. Tony had always loved hearing himself talk if he was being completely honest, so hearing someone else enjoy his voice as much as he did was a hell of an ego boost.

So he did it on nights when he was bored, opening up an extra line specifically for those types of calls. He poured himself a generous glass of bourbon, set some mood music in the background for any caller looking for the full experience, and palmed himself lazily through his jeans on each call.

None of them really got him going, of course. He’s far too used to this. It’s fun, but the spark of excitement that he felt his first few weeks of picking up the gig was no longer there. The calls were never really about him anyways. As long as his clients got off and left him with a good review, he could care less about the dull ache in his groin. For most calls, at least.

Tonight, Tony sipped at his whiskey and listened to a horny young woman get off on a fantasy about cheating on her husband. She wasn’t really a regular, but Tony remembered her because of how nasally her voice was when she was moaning. She had gotten off by screaming her husband’s name instead of Tony’s, which was fine for him, but she was so embarrassed that she ended up hanging up on him as soon as she orgasmed.

He saved feeling bad for the morning, but Tony couldn’t help laughing to himself about the whole situation. It wasn’t every day he got mistaken for a husband, after all.

As he was filling up his tumbler with whiskey for the second time that night, his phone began vibrating. It was late into the night, and he was considering going to bed, but one more call couldn’t hurt. He had nothing better to do once his refill was finished.

Tony answered the call, making sure to make as little noise as possible as he lowered his voice and answered with a gruff drawl. “Hey there, baby. Awful late for a call.”

The silence on the other end made Tony hesitate. Did he accidentally answer a friend with his sexline opening? He already came up with a few lies about having a long-distance girlfriend when he heard an audible swallow and a few mumbled words, all with an unfamiliar voice. Tony turned his head to breathe a heavy sigh out of relief and waited for the person on the other end to catch their breath.

“U-um, hi,” came the response, and it sounded like the person on the other end was just seconds from passing out. 

Tony could tell he was young, probably just started college. He wondered if maybe he was calling on a bet, trying to get a phone sex worker to act slutty while his friends giggled in the background. Wouldn’t have been the first time.

Still, Tony had a job to do. So he took a sip of whiskey and headed back to his couch. It wouldn’t be a long night.

“I’m not bothering you, am I?” the boy asked. Tony had to stop himself from laughing at the sheer amount of nerves in his voice.

“Bothering me? I’ve been waiting for you all night, sweet thing.” Tony swirls the amber drink in his glass. “What do I call you?”

“Um, Peter.”

Tony bit his lip. God, this was kinda cute. The nervousness he heard in Peter’s voice made him think he was probably not being called on a dare, and that Peter’s call was genuine. He was going to give the kid something to remember. He took a quick sip and talked through the burn traveling down his throat.

“Well, Peter, what am I taking off of you this evening?”

There was a long silence from the other end, and Tony wondered if Peter might have hung up on him. 

“Just a T-shirt and jeans.” Peter stumbled over his words, talking too quickly and forcing a laugh. “Very un-sexy, I know.”

“But, it’s comfortable and casual, and very easy to remove.” Tony leaned back against the cushions and relaxed. “I can just imagine how easy that shirt of yours would come up when I get you in my hands. Where do want me to touch you, baby boy?”

Something akin to a whimper left Peter’s lips. Tony used that new discovery to try reeling the boy in. When Peter didn’t answer his question right away, Tony used a little more force in his voice. “Are you ignoring me now? C’mon, baby, where do you want me to touch you?”

“I-I don’t know,” Peter mumbles, and he sounded frustrated. “Fuck, this was so stupid. My friend said— ugh, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have called.”

Embarrassment, stammered shame; Tony felt for the kid. A total phone sex virgin, and he was undoubtedly beating himself up for letting a friend convince him to use a paid professional to get himself off. Not that Tony was really a professional in this field. It was all just for fun. At least, it was fun when his clients were actually enjoying themselves.

Tony could roll with it, though. He hummed quietly into the speaker of the phone. Maybe the kid wanted control in this situation, wanted to pretend he could dominate and make demands. Tony supposed he could play submissive if it meant making Peter a little more comfortable.

“Hey, hey, don’t beat yourself up about it. We all get nervous for our first time.” Tony sipped his whiskey again and heard Peter take a deep breath to calm himself down. “How about we slow down, huh? What do you want me to do for you?”

Peter went silent again, and Tony was absolutely sure that he would hang up on him.

“Tell me what to do,” he asked. “I don’t know what I’m doing, I just— Take the reigns here, please.”

He sounded so sure then, though, asking to be directed. Less hesitant, less embarrassed. Just a desperate plea for something. Oh, how could Tony deny him that. 

“Okay, kitten. I can do that.”

Tony’s lips felt uncharacteristically dry, and he swiped his tongue across his lips to get something on them. Another sip of whiskey gave him time to think of the best approach: “Let me hear you touch yourself, baby. Through your clothes.”

Peter doesn’t respond, but there’s a tell-tale shuffle on the other end of the line, and then Peter’s gasping into the speaker. He still sounds like he’s holding back, but Tony doesn’t fault him for it. He could still be nervous, or around other people, or trying not to disturb a roommate. It’s enough, sweet and heated and keening, and Tony found himself reacting to it. His cock twitched, but he ignored it and smothered the heat that washed over him.

“That’s it, baby boy,” Tony encouraged, using the pet name that got him such a pretty reaction the first time. He made another whimper, and Tony liked to think that maybe he touched himself harder or rolled his hips up against his hand. “Nice and slow, are you hard for me?”

Peter bit back a moan but gave Tony an affirmative _mm-hm_. Tony chuckled into his whiskey. Those sweet little moans, how his breath shook; Peter sounded downright _delicious_. Tony shifted on his couch as he felt himself growing hard at just listening to the boy get off. He set the whiskey aside and palmed himself slowly to help alleviate the aroused ache as his erection grew against his pants.

“Mm, you’ve got me hard, too,” Tony moaned, and he bit back a noise as he rolled up into his palm. “Thinking about my hands around your pretty little cock now? Take it out, let Daddy see how hard you are.”

Tony hesitated, a split-second worry that maybe he had gone too far for the boy in calling himself “daddy.” That thought was quickly shot down when Peter moaned the word back at him, somewhere in there a hidden plea, and Tony could hear the faint sound of a zipper being drawn down. He tried not to think of what the boy might look like, his hair or eye color, the way his cock laid out across his palm, cradled by his fingers.

His own dick was rock hard and aching when he pulled it out to squeeze the base and roll his hips into his fist.

“Daddy,” Peter moaned, and Tony couldn’t resist the groan he answered it with. “Daddy, please, m’so close.”

“You wanna come, baby?” Tony asked and relished the quiet sob he heard. He twisted his wrist as his fingers encircled the head of his shaft. “You can come. Let Daddy hear how sweet your voice is.”

Peter’s voice hitched high, breaking as a long moan burst from his lips, and Tony wished he could watch the boy on the other end fall apart as ropes of cum spurt over his fingers and bedsheets. Tony listened to him whimper through the aftershocks, and he squeezed the base of his own cock in order to stave off the orgasm he could feel cresting low in his gut. 

A few moments of silence passed between them before Tony spoke. “You did good, Peter. My good, sweet boy.”

There was silence still, and Tony wondered if the boy was beginning to regret his actions. It wouldn’t be the first time someone hung up on him without so much as a thanks for the orgasm. Tony lazily stroked himself in the silence, anticipating the familiar click of the line disconnecting.

What he didn’t expect was the very quiet and very rushed farewell of: “Good night, Daddy.”

_Click_

Tony let the hand holding his phone fall onto the cushion beside him, Peter’s moans still echoing in his head. He squeezed himself at the memory and cast his eyes down at his erection throbbing in between his fingers.

A first-timer on his line had done this to him. Some virgin caller who had taken to calling him Daddy with absolutely no hesitation, who had moaned so sweetly in his ear while touching himself (and come so quickly Tony knew he had never done it before) had gotten him so hot and bothered that he had pulled himself out in the middle of a call.

Tony polished off his whiskey and went to take an ice-cold shower. He tried not to think of Peter while under the freezing spray. He tried not to jerk himself off against the shower wall and watch his release pour down the drain. He tried not to hope that Peter would call again the next night, or the night after that, or ever again.

Not that he needed to try too hard, when he answered his phone three nights later and a familiar voice spoke softly in his ear, “_Hi, Daddy_.”


	2. Chapter 2

Peter bit back tears as he threw his backpack down hard onto his bedroom floor and locked the door behind him. The stain on his hoodie reminded him of his failure from that morning; mixing up chemicals in his lab had resulted in a full-building evacuation, and his entire chemistry lab had no problem letting everyone know he was to blame. 

It certainly didn’t help that Flash made one of his stupid livestreams wherein he broadcasted Peter’s fuckup to the entire school. He was a laughingstock, getting snotty remarks shouted at him all day while walking between classes.

_Hey, Parker, where’s the fire?_

_Blow up any labs today?_

_Can you come to my 12 o’clock midterm and set fire to Professor Strange’s desk, too? I didn’t study for it and I’m totally going to fail._

Peter shed his dirty hoodie and shoes and tossed it across the room before flopping onto his bed and forcefully groaning into his pillow. He wanted to suffocate himself in it and scream so loud his neighbors would hear it. Every instance of mockery from the day stabbed at his ego like knives until he couldn’t bear thinking of it anymore.

He needed a distraction. Fast.

Studying? No, it just reminded him too much of his laboratory fuckup. He thought about working on his grad school thesis, but again, his mistake kept creeping up with each thought of schoolwork. Peter pulled his face out of the pillow only to pick it up and pull it over the back of his head. Smothering himself to death sounded as good a distraction as any.

The phone nestled in his back pocket vibrated, and Peter pulled his head out from beneath his pillow to check his incoming caller. Aunt May from her cell phone. He answered, giving her a greeting that easily covered up his frustration from the day.

“Hey, May. Are you on your way home from work?”

“Hey, Pete!” May said, and Peter realized he could hear a crowd in the background. “No, I got invited to dinner with some coworkers, so I’ll be late home. We’re getting Mexican. Do you want me to bring you home anything?”

“No, thanks,” Peter said with a small smile. At least May was having a good day. “I think I’ve still got some Chinese leftovers in the fridge. Have fun and call me if you need a ride home.”

“I’m not gonna drink, Pete. Night!”

Peter hung up and returned to his wallowing. At the very least, May wouldn’t be around to witness his lowest point in college.

He peeked out from where he had buried his face into the pillow and stared at his cell phone. His mind immediately supplied him with the memory from a few weeks ago of how he had jerked himself off while a complete stranger had cooed and called him pet names, told him how good he was, called himself _Daddy_. Peter had been completely blindsided by the things that phone call had done to him.

Not that he was complaining. The word felt so good rolling off his tongue.

“Daddy,” he murmured to himself, eyes slipping shut at the bloom of heat at his cheeks. 

Teeth sunk into his bottom lip. May wouldn’t be home for a few more hours, and the bottle of strawberry-flavored lube certainly wouldn’t use itself. Neither would the brand-new “realistically-styled” didlo he had bought online and hidden in his room when the package had arrived. He had yet to use it.

_Who better to help me break it in than You-Know-Who?_

It was a better distraction than studying, that was for sure.

Peter didn’t know exactly what his Daddy looked like. He was an older man, that much he knew, with dark hair that was going silver from stress at his temples. (He had called it “a curse of age” until Peter told him how much he loved his Daddy’s graying hair.) He kept his facial hair neatly trimmed and always drank whiskey when he worked on the hotline. Peter definitely imagined how his mouth would taste if he could get his tongue between the older man’s lips.

Not knowing what he looked like didn’t stop Peter at all from trying to imagine him. He had even googled celebrities that shared the sparse details he was given to see if he could conjure up a face that matched the voice in his ear. Nothing fit so far, but Peter wasn’t one to give up.

He did know the man’s real name, though: Tony. Generic enough that looking the name up on social media produced hundreds of millions of results, but personal enough that Peter could feel somewhat closer to the person on the phone.

His stomach climbed up into his throat as he found the hotline’s number in his call history and redialed it. This part was nerve-wracking. He had no problem moaning into the speaker and getting himself off with someone in his ear, but having the anticipation of waiting for the hotline operator to answer his call gave him restless butterflies in his stomach. 

There was a click on the other end, and the woman’s monotonous voice spoke through the speaker asking what “fantasy” he was looking for. It was maybe the fifth time he’d heard the cold open for the hotline and he still couldn’t get over how utterly uninterested she sounded while delivering it. 

“Um, I’m looking for a specific person, actually,” he said. “Extension forty-six?”

“Hold, please.”

Peter felt himself relax as the hold music began playing. Getting past her was the hardest part; here, he moved on to someone who didn’t judge him. Or, at the very least, didn’t _sound_ like they were judging him. Peter didn’t have to hide. His Daddy let him be unashamedly himself while they fucked.

The line finally connected, cheesy saxophone music abruptly cutting off in his ear, and Tony’s smooth voice purred at him through the earpiece. “Hey there, sweet thing.”

“‘Hey there’ yourself, Daddy.”

“Well, well, look who it is,” he said, laughing, while Peter bit back an excited giggle. “I haven’t heard from you in almost two weeks, baby boy. Where’d you run off to?”

“Just living life,” Peter answered. He moved to lay down on his stomach and prop his head on a folded arm, ankles crossed and resting on top of his abandoned pillow. “But I missed you.”

The growl that answered sent chills up Peter’s spine. His skin lit up. 

“I missed you, too, Pete. I’ve been rather lonely since our last talk.” Peter liked to think that Tony was sincere, that he genuinely looked forward to Peter’s calls. It certainly helped that he recognized Peter’s voice.

Peter sighed contentedly and relaxed into his mattress. This was exactly what he needed after such a shitty day.

Tony seemed to pick up on his uneasiness. There was silence, probably drinking from his glass, before he said, “Heavy sigh, baby. What has my boy so worried?”

_My boy._ God, Peter was so fucked.

Peter intended to lie to him, but he liked pretending that Tony worried about him. It was hard to deny the man anything when he spoke like that, right in Peter’s ear. He supposed he could be vague enough, not going into too much detail so as not to take up too much of Tony’s time.

“I just fucked up at school,” Peter said. He repositioned himself to run fingers through his hair. “It was a public fuckup, so it’s not like the only people who know are my labmates. Hell, my advisor probably heard about it, too.”

“I’m sorry you had such a bad day. Anything I can do to make it better?”

Peter had hoped he would ask, and even if he didn’t, he knew just how to segue their conversation in his favor. “There is one thing I can think of,” he said, then lowered his voice to add, “Daddy.”

“Yeah, baby? What can Daddy do to make it better?”

Peter chewed on his lip before answering.

“I want you to fuck me.”

He could hear what might have been a choking sound on the other end of the line and tried not to smile at himself. The thought of surprising Tony by making demands made him a little lightheaded, but in the best way. He pushed himself up to kneel on his mattress while waiting for Tony’s response.

Tony groaned once he got a hold of himself. “That what you want, huh? Want Daddy to fuck you so hard you can’t think of anything else but his cock inside you?”

Peter held back a whine and nodded before remembering Tony couldn’t see him. “Yes, Daddy, I want it so bad.”

He was already growing hard in his pants, and he put a hand over his crotch to palm at the bulge there. He gave himself a few gentle squeezes but nothing more than that; Tony liked control, liked knowing that Peter listened to and obeyed him, and he didn’t want to come too quickly. He did roll up into his palm, though, to keep the ache from overwhelming him.

“What do we say when we want something, Peter?”

“_Please_.”

“That’s my good boy.”

Peter scrambled across his mattress to the nightstand drawer where he kept his lube and new toy. The lube still had the plastic seal around the cap, and he had to stop himself from excitedly ripping it off with his teeth. He returned to kneeling on the bed, the phone pressed tightly to his ear while he waited for Tony’s instructions. 

“Tell me what you’re wearing, pretty boy. I wanna know what I’m tearing off you tonight.”

Peter looked down at himself, wincing at the shirt he was wearing. It was corny, a red short-sleeve shirt with the words _If it wasn’t for physics and law enforcement, I’d be unstoppable_ written across the chest. Ned had gotten it for him for his birthday as a gag gift, not expecting Peter to unironically wear it in public. On his legs was a pair of dark skinny jeans.

He really didn’t have anything sexy in his closet.

Tony never seemed to mind. Even at Peter’s vague answer of _just a t-shirt_ was enough to get a groan from him.

“I bet you’d look good in one of mine,” Tony said into his ear while Peter made quick work of removing his jeans and underwear. “You’d have it falling off your shoulder, barely fitting in it. God, you’d look so delicious, though.”

“Your T-shirt and nothing else?” Peter supplied, and he rolled his hips down into the mattress. “I wanna wear that instead. Can you imagine me like that?”

Tony hissed between his teeth and praised how good Peter would look in a black AC/DC number. Peter sucked his bottom lip into his mouth and ground against his bed again. God, what he would give to actually wear it, straddling Tony’s lap, with a hand larger than his climbing up his thigh and underneath the shirt’s hem. He whined at the mental image now seared in his brain.

“Yeah, baby boy, I definitely can,” Tony said, and Peter hoped he was getting himself off with that image. “Fuck, keep that shirt on, will you? Look so fucking _good_ in my clothes. The only thing better than having you naked.”

Peter moaned and rocked down onto his mattress again, the black and red bottle of fruity lube catching his eye. His mouth watered at the sight of it. He needed something inside of him, and he needed it now.

“Daddyyy,” Peter whined. He reached for the lube. “I need you.”

“Need you too, baby. Want you so fucking bad.” Tony’s voice sounded so rough, so wrecked, and it was all because of Peter. That thought went straight to Peter’s dick. Peter was sure he could have come on that thought alone, no stimulation necessary.

“You got lube?” Tony asked, and Peter confirmed it, popping the cap open where he knew Tony could hear. “Get yourself nice and wet for me, baby. Open up for my cock. I’m gonna fuck you so good, it’s gonna ruin anyone else for you.”

Peter scrambled to get onto his back and set the phone by his pillow on speaker. The lube was cool on his skin as he dribbled it out onto his fingers; the artificially sweet smell of strawberries flooded his nostrils and aided in his hormone-drunk high. He licked a small stripe of it off his fingertip and hummed at the taste. It wasn’t as sweet as it smelled, but the flavor was there.

Unprompted, Tony’s voice came through the speaker: “Spread your legs for me, honey, let me see that sweet little hole of yours. Fuck, can I even get my fingers in you? You’re so goddamn tight.”

Peter’s mouth fell open when he reached between his thighs and the first finger breached through. Instead of a moan, a breathy, high-pitched noise squeezed itself from his throat. His head fell to the side, eyes locating his slim black cell, and he pressed the finger in all the way until his knuckles brushed against his ass.

Each breath was accompanied by a quiet exhalation as he slowly fucked his finger in and out of himself. He clenched his eyes shut. Maybe, he thought, he could pretend it was Tony’s finger pressing into him, another one sliding in beside the first to work him open, teaching his body to welcome the pleasant intrusion. But he knew it was his own fingers by the ache in his wrist and their slender and long size. He liked to think Tony’s would be bigger, thicker, much more pleasurable compared to his own.

Tony moaned next to his ear, and with his eyes closed, Peter could imagine the man was lying next to him and watching his face contort in pleasure from being fingered open.

“God, baby, you feel so fucking good.” Tony groaned on the last word. Was he working himself in his fingers or just acting? Either way, it set a fire in Peter’s chest.

Peter let out a desperate whine and bucked his hips up onto his fingers. “Please,” he begged, opening his eyes. He half-expected to see his Daddy there and was disappointed to find only his phone, still mid-call. “I’m going crazy, Tony, I need you.”

“Yeah, baby boy, I know. I got you.” Tony hissed, high and sharp. “You good to take my cock now? Let me hear you.”

A dejected whimper left his lips as Peter pulled his fingers out of himself. The empty feeling that accompanied their removal was an unfamiliar sensation. He grabbed for the dildo still at his feet and slicked it up quickly. Peter made no attempts to be quiet, and Tony chuckled.

“So eager. Tell Daddy how long you’ve been waiting for him to fuck you.”

“Day one,” Peter admitted as he moved to lie on his stomach and prop his ass up in the air on his knees, cheek now shoved into his pillow, with the dildo held awkwardly between his legs. The mattress dipped and bounced beneath his struggle to find balance. “I’ve wanted you since day one. Wanted you to pin me to the bed and fuck me until I couldn’t stand.”

“Be careful what you wish for.” Tony’s voice held a promise Peter could only wish to be kept. “I’m gonna put it in now. Slow and steady. I want you to feel every inch of it as my cock splits you open.”

Peter followed his instructions, pressing the head against his unused hole and prodding it with wet and sticky fingers until he could nudge it past the tight rim and inside. His breath caught in his throat with the initial penetration, and the pleasant slide and pressure of the silicone dick pushing further inside of him ripped a moan from him. A litany of _Daddy, Daddy, yes, Daddy, please_ poured from his lips until the fake balls of the dildo laid against his own.

Peter let out a heavy breath muffled by the plush pillow on his cheek.

He’s full, so _full_. Every inch of it Tony’s.

His fingers curled into his bed sheets when he shifted, and the head pressed against something that sent liquid fire through his veins. Peter nearly bit his tongue from the shock of it.

“Daddy,” he cried, pulling the phone closer. On the other end, he swore he could hear Tony’s breath hitching as though he was working himself over, masturbating to the sound of Peter getting himself off.

“Good boy, taking all of Daddy’s cock,” Tony said into the phone, and the praise went straight to Peter’s neglected dick. He managed to resist touching it, ignoring that ache to shove his fingers into his ass. Now, he was so hard he hurt. “How is it, knowing only your Daddy can make you feel like this?”

Peter’s mouth opened but no sound came out. He moved his hips, not daring to do anything more without Tony’s permission.

“Fuck me, _please_,” Peter keened.

“I could never say no to you, baby boy. You want Daddy to be rough with you?”

“Yes!”

Peter’s fingers struggled to find a steady grip on the edge of the dildo; so much lube, the smell of strawberries permeating each breath he took, that he couldn’t get the silicone to move the way he wanted. It took some doing, but he managed to lock his fingers around the shaft and pull it out of himself slowly. With how awkward the angle was, his shoulder now digging into the mattress, he couldn’t manage to pull more than half of the fake cock out.

With a quick flick of his wrist, he shoved some of the dildo back into his hole. He gasped as it pulled at his rim. Some more lube slicked its way in and out of him, until he could start a steady pace.

Tony sat patiently on the phone and listened to each sound he made. In turn, Peter focused on the other man’s breathing and groaning. He worked himself up to a steady rhythm of the cock pushing in and out of himself, hard enough to make his bed squeak beneath him. He shoved the dick into himself hard, hitting his prostate with the head, and bucked his hips. 

His cock begged for attention. He kept his other hand clutching at his pillow.

The squeaky mattress, the sloppy squelching of the generously-lubricated dildo pushing into him; Peter wondered if Tony could hear all of it over the debauched moans and pleading. The word _Daddy_ almost exclusively left his lips with each thrust. Pleas of harder, faster were met with permission to fuck himself that way.

Tony’s admissions were scattered amongst a nearly-endless stream of praise. “So tight, baby. I can feel every inch of you on me. Just for me, aren’t you, baby? You’re made perfect just for me. I’m going to come inside you and eat it out, watching you squirm on my tongue. You’d take it so good, baby boy, like you always take me, and you’d fucking love it. Every inch of you is so goddamn perfect.”

Peter thrust his hips again to seek some sort of reprieve from the endless throbbing between his thighs. The things those words did to him…

“D-Daddy,” he stuttered as a hard thrust sent stars blooming behind his eyelids. “Daddy, please, I’m so close. I’m gonna come.”

“Come for me, Petey,” Tony said. He sounded like he was straining to smother his voice, holding back. Was he trying not to moan into the speaker? 

Peter didn’t have time to dwell on that thought. His other hand gripped his dark cock so hard that his legs shook, and he was barely three pumps in before he spilled over his hand, strands of spunk tangling between his fingers and dripping down onto his bedsheets. Peter nearly screamed, Tony’s name on his lips as he buried his face into the pillow to drown out the sound so May didn’t get an awkward confrontation with the neighbors later.

He jerked himself furiously, the dildo pushed in as far as he could physically fit it, until the pain overwhelmed the pleasure. The sharp sting from the head of his dick under his fingers made him tear his hand away from himself.

On the phone, he could hear Tony had gone silent, breathing heavily. Peter frowned at having missed hearing his Daddy come, but made sure he was heard as he licked the sticky mess of seed and strawberries from his hand. That earned him a pained groan.

“Fuck, baby, I don’t have that kind of energy anymore,” Tony said, and Peter couldn’t hide his laughter. “But I appreciate the effort.”

The dildo took some work but Peter eventually pulled it out and tossed it onto the floor. He would have to remember to clean it before he used it the next time, and maybe find a better hiding place for it than his sock drawer. That one time May came close to finding it was the closest Peter had ever come to having a heart attack. He wasn’t looking for a repeat performance.

Peter laid on his side on the bed to purposely ignore the puddle of his release still resting on top of his bed sheets. Nothing grosser than laying in it, he thought.

“Thank you, Daddy,” he said after he caught his breath. “I needed that.”

“Anything for you.” Tony chuckled on the other end. “We should probably wrap this up. I feel guilty knowing you’ve paid a good chunk of cash for tonight.”

_I want to stay_, Peter thought, but he caught himself before the words left his lips. Instead, he just agreed with a quiet, “Yeah. You’re right. I’ll catch you later, Tones.”

“Hey, now, don’t sound so disappointed. I could never ignore your calls, my sweet boy. I’ll always answer for you.”

For once, Peter’s thankful Tony can’t see how his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes. He bid Tony goodnight and hung up. One breath, and then two. He really needed to clean up; his sheets and toy needed to be washed, and he needed a shower. 

May still wasn’t home when he started the washing machine and when he finished bathing. He caught his wet-haired reflection in the mirror and tried not to cringe at just how disappointed he looked.

“He’s a sex line operator,” Peter said to himself while pushing wet curls from his forehead, “nothing more.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the idea for this chapter came from another anon in my inbox! 
> 
> **prompt from tumblr:** Idea For your phone sex fix which I love Peter accidentally hits the face time button while getting off with his eyes closed

Another day, another night of Tony’s sweet baby boy Peter calling him for some stress relief. Tony could never admit it if someone were to ask, but he was starting to look forward to Peter’s calls. They were the only ones he really got himself off to, the only time he felt compelled to pull his cock out and stroke it to the sound of another person coming.

And fuck, did he have a pretty voice. Climbing octaves when he released and moaning so dirty in his ear when he called Tony _Daddy_. Tony tried not to think of the time a female client called him that while she was masturbating, nor how quickly his cock had softened for her.

For Peter, though, he might be able to get his refractory period from his college days back.

Tony would be flat-out lying if he said that he hadn’t tried to picture what the kid looked like, sweaty and drunk on arousal, fucking himself silly and moaning Tony’s name like it was the only thing tethering him to existence. He wanted to know how the kid looked when he came, or how his face would light up when he smiled or, or…

He groaned as he looked at the familiar number on his screen. He was so screwed.

For his baby, though, he’d didn’t mind.

Tony answered the phone and barely got a word in before a very slurred and giggly voice greeted him with a loud, “Hey there, _Daadddyyyy_.” Tony’s mouth fell open on a greeting stopped cold by the voice in his ear. He took a moment to listen to the tittering on the other end before smothering a reprimand.

“Pete,” he said slowly, “have you been drinking?”

“Mm-hm,” came the pleased reply, and that was followed by a few more giggles. “Went to a house party, lost two rounds of beer pong.”

“_Two_ rounds?” Tony rubbed his forehead. “Baby, you are going to have so much regret in the morning. Drink some water, take an antacid, and go to bed. You can call me if you want tomorrow night, but you need to sleep that drunkenness off.”

“Don’ wanna.” Tony didn’t need to see Peter’s face to know he was pouting. His voice was an open book, even more so now that he wasn’t sober. Tony could hear the squeak of box springs, meaning he likely was too inebriated to maintain his balance and flopped over. At least it wasn’t the floor; small miracles. 

“I wanted to see you, Daddy. I missed you so much.”

Tony let out a heavy breath, although he couldn’t help the amused scoff. “Yeah, I missed you too. You mentioned having midterms recently. Is that why you went out and got plastered?”

“Maaaybe,” Peter all but sang into the speaker. 

Tony wondered just how bad the hangover was going to be, since Peter was now intermittently giggling through his words. They slurred and morphed together as they tumbled from his lips, but Tony had little problem deciphering his words. He’d been through enough benders himself to be able to understand drunken rambling. Peter’s was a cakewalk.

Still, it didn’t make him feel better that Peter was drunk in the first place.

“You should sleep, baby. We can talk tomorrow.”

“I can’t wait that long. I _need_ you.” 

Peter gave a little whimper at the last word, and Tony hated that his cock twitched with interest. His ear was filled with little breaths and moans. Tony’s mind betrayed him with the image of his baby rolling his hips into the bed, fucking against the friction he could get, and he crossed his legs after another interested twitch from his member. It certainly didn’t help that Peter was now moaning his name, begging him.

Tony chewed on his bottom lip.

“You sure, baby?” he asked. 

“Yesss. Yes, please, Daddy. I missed you so bad.”

Tony inwardly cursed and palmed his traitorous cock. Peter was going to be the death of him. Swore on his life.

That thought certainly didn’t stop him from giving himself a squeeze and rubbing his palm down onto himself. It was nice to hear Peter’s voice again. Nearly a month of radio silence from him, only for him to reappear drunk but horny as ever and begging for Tony to fuck him. He almost felt sorry, taking Peter like this. He would have to call Pepper back and ask her to refund the poor kid’s money when they were finished. The guilt would eat him alive otherwise.

For now, he had a brat to deal with.

“Are you touching yourself, baby boy?” he asked, rolling his hips up into his palm. Even with his moment of inner turmoil, his dick hadn’t flagged a bit. Tony wasn’t sure what that said about him. “You fucking your little fist for me?”

“Mm-hm,” Peter whimpered, breath hitching. “Feels so good, Daddy. Wish it was you.”

“Does it, baby? You feel good?” At Peter’s affirmative moan, Tony sharply said, “Stop, Peter.”

Peter whined, all but sobbing into Tony’s ear. He wanted it so bad, wanted to come, wanted his Daddy to fuck him. But Tony knew he wanted to be a good boy, to obey his Daddy, to make him happy. He still complained, though, and Tony let him. 

Tony undid his belt and slipped his hand into his boxers to palm at the half-mast erection pressing against the tight confines of his jeans. He listened intently to the bratty whining on the other end and squeezed around himself.

“Shh, baby. You’ll get what you want. But you have to be punished first,” Tony cooed. It took every ounce of his self-control to not work his dick furiously and come to the sound of Peter’s high-pitched _Daddy, please_.

“You went out drinking when you know you’re too young, and then you called up your Daddy while drunk, and for what? A booty call. Misbehaving deserves a fitting punishment, don’t you think so, baby boy?”

Peter just hummed an answer rather than using his words, but it was good enough for Tony. He let himself groan into the speaker, let Peter hear him while he worked himself until he was hard. He wondered how Peter was reacting to this, if his hair was a mess and his eyes unfocused the way Tony imagined him. 

Would he chew on his lip while waiting for commands?

“You wanna come, don’t you, baby?”

“Yes, Daddy. Please let me.”

“Yeah?” Tony pulled himself out of his underwear, flushed and red and leaking pre onto his fingertips. “Then put a pillow between your legs and rut like the little slut you are. That’s how you’re getting off tonight, if you want to get off at all.”

Peter’s voice broke on a moan. Tony could hear him rustling around on the other end. He wondered briefly what Peter was wearing, thinking he should have asked earlier so he could at least imagine the boy’s body, but that thought was abandoned the moment Peter gave him a shaky breath. He could almost hear the way his boy was moving his hips against whatever cushion he had put between his thighs.

“Did you remove your underwear?” he asked.

“No, should I—”

“Keep them on. If you’re going to start this call sloppy, you can finish it that way, too.”

Peter keened and Tony hoped he was grinding against his pillow like asked, his little mewls of pleasure perfectly timed with each lazy and desperate thrust of his hips. Tony squeezed himself on the upstroke, moaning deep in his throat, eyes slipping shut to the symphony in his ear. Peter had a voice he could listen to for the rest of his life.

The audio clipped out suddenly, as if the connection between them had been cut off. Tony stopped masturbating, pulling his phone away just enough to look at the screen. Did the kid hang up on him, or did one of them drop the call? His phone screen was black. Maybe hadn’t charged it that morning like he thought, and the damn thing had just died on him.

Or, he realized when his phone screen lit back up, maybe it was something else.

Like Peter, his baby boy, accidentally hitting the FaceTime option on his phone and giving Tony the perfect view of what he looked like half-dressed in a baggy red sweatshirt and his underwear, and his face pressed into a mattress.

And accidentally letting Tony see his pretty little face scrunched up in aroused desperation as he rolled his hips down onto the white pillow nestled snug between his thighs. God, he was gorgeous. Young, with thick brown hair now disheveled and messy and wet bitten-red lips opened in a silent moan. His brows were pulled tight in concentration, face relaxing as his pitch rose and he said, “_Daddy_.”

Tony’s mouth fell open as well, blinking as he tried to will himself to wake up from a dream. He had a face for the name, for the voice that had been moaning in his ear and sweetly calling him Daddy for nearly three months. And he looked like _that_.

His dick stirred again, fully interested in the display hypnotizing him as Peter ground against the pillow and moaned again. The phone must have been on speaker the entire time. One hand was holding the phone out in front of him, possibly unaware of the button he had pressed, while the other twisted his dark blue bedding in a white-knuckled fist. The angle, though, gave him a perfect view of how Peter’s back arched and his ass presented in the air.

“Holy shit,” he moaned, unable to stop himself. He panicked, then, trying to see if his own face was visible in the call. He put a finger over his phone’s camera just in case, and against his better judgement, continued watching his baby try to get himself off. “Fuck, baby, are you close?”

“Yes, Daddy,” Peter said, and fuck, watching him actually say the word was a completely different experience. Tony found himself wrapping his fingers around the base of his shaft to keep from immediately blowing his load. “It’s good, but I need to come.”

Tony wanted to watch him come, watch how that beautiful face would pinch together at the peak of his pleasure. He wanted to watch Peter fall apart, to know how he looked when he fell over that precipice of pleasure. He had heard the boy do so before, had brought him there with his voice and commands alone. To watch him do so would be priceless.

Unfortunately, Tony never got to see it. 

Peter opened his eyes (brown, they’re fucking brown, like a glass of perfectly-aged scotch) and realization broke through his haze of arousal and alcohol. He realized his face was being recorded, although Tony’s camera was completely covered, and he scrambled to turn it off. 

The call ended, and Tony was left staring at his now-blank phone screen with his dick still achingly hard in his hand. He couldn’t get Peter’s face out of his head, in that moment just before he realized he was live, pleasure taking over him and leaving him a mess against his bed sheets. He could imagine that face now, lip jutting out in a pout as he begged Tony to let him come.

It wouldn’t be the first or the last time he jerked himself off in his shower while thinking of his baby boy, of Peter becoming a writhing mess beneath him. But this time was different. He could close his eyes and imagine his spunk painting the defined features of Peter’s cheeks white instead having to watch it wash down the drain.


	4. Chapter 4

Peter was never going to get drunk again. Ever. In his life. He made a promise to himself while he was still vomiting his guts up from the night before, head hanging over the rim of the toilet while May laughed herself to death in the doorway. He said as much, asked May to hold him accountable, before another surge of nausea forced his head back into the bowl. God, how much did he eat at that stupid party?

The whole room was a spinning, swimming mess, though he was 80% sure he wasn’t moving. The cold bathroom floor seeped through his thin gray sweatpants and grounded him. His head spun like a top on his shoulders. Peter wondered if his face was as green as he felt it was.

May wiped a tear out of her eye once she had managed to stand straight.

“Oh, I’m so happy I’m here to witness this!” she managed in between breathless cackles. “Wait, where’s my camera? We have to document this important milestone in your life.”

“May, please,” Peter begged, head pounding behind his eyes. He spat into the toilet and groaned as another wave of burning bile bubbled up in his throat.. “I’m already suffering enough.”

May giggled and leaned her shoulder into the doorway. “Hangovers are a bitch, huh? Once you’re done yakking, come to the kitchen. A big greasy breakfast is exactly what you need.”

_Please don’t talk about food_, is what Peter wanted to tell her as she turned and walked away from the bathroom. What came out instead was a guttural moan as he leaned back over the bowl of the toilet and continued throwing his lungs up. May’s laughter echoed through the hallway from where she was rummaging around in the kitchen.

Once he was convinced that his body was done ejecting everything from the night before, and then some, he cleaned out his mouth, brushed his teeth, and returned to his room to change out of his dirty pajamas. How had he managed to get into them when he could barely manage getting into the door the night before? May had all but carried him back to his bedroom; he remembered stumbling around with his arm over her shoulders and trying not to stop on both their feet.

He picked up a pair of jeans discarded on his floor, tossed them into his hamper, and froze.

His cell phone was perched precariously on the edge of his mattress, just at the foot of his bed, right where he had passed out the night before. His stomach did flips and spins. He briefly remembered a phone call, and waking up with a half-chub and a pillow between his legs. A deep, commanding voice echoing in his head…

_Fuck. Fuckfuckfuck. Fuck no._

Peter knocked his phone to the floor while scrambling for it and opened up his call history with trembling hands, regret pouring through every pore of his body as he spotted a familiar number listed right at the top, just past 1 in the morning. He could barely breathe as he looked at the time of the call, of thinking about Tony hearing him being completely and utterly plastered for the first time and…

And getting himself off. What had he done?

He wanted to die of embarrassment.

Instead, he put on a fresh pair of lounge clothes and answered May’s call that she had breakfast ready, which included hashbrowns, scrambled eggs wet with butter, and an assortment of painkillers and antacids to make him feel a little less shitty.

—

Peter went two days without calling Tony, which wouldn’t normally be such a feat in his mind if not for the fact that it was purposely to avoid being rejected or laughed at by the man that Peter may or may not have a crush on. Which, if he was honest, was completely ridiculous. The guy was a _sex hotline operator_. His whole job revolved around fitting into dozens upon dozens of sexual roles for strangers.

Peter needed to get over him, and maybe this was a good step in that direction. 

He focused a little harder on his class, pen scratching notes into his worn notebook as Dr. Strange rattled on about star bodies and black holes. He liked Dr. Strange; the guy was almost always a no-nonsense, serious professor with a face that made cracking jokes in his class nearly impossible, because it resulted in a two-second stare that made you regret your life choices before he continued as though you hadn’t said a word. It made getting through his class easier when Peter knew they wouldn’t be interrupted by someone trying to be a comedian.

And, of course, Dr. Strange loved the students who stayed behind to ask questions or for clarification on certain notes. He really loved his job, and Peter respected him for it.

He hadn’t expected to stay behind today, already pulling his backpack into his lap as Strange reminded them of due homework and to read over their lab assignment before catching Peter’s eye and pointing him out.

“Mr. Parker! Stay behind, will you?” he asked loudly, and Peter felt several eyes turn towards him. Peter’s mouth went dry, and he simply nodded in response.

Four students stayed back to ask questions. One girl asked for an extension in turning in a lab report due to a family death, and Strange’s face softened as he promised her an extra week to type it up. Two others asked for simple clarification on the day’s lecture, specifically on black hole formation, while the last showed him a few papers regarding testing accommodations for a learning disability. Strange signed off on them and all but shooed her away when he remembered that Peter was waiting for him, propped against the table directly across from the podium up front.

Peter must have looked as nervous as he felt, because the first thing out of Dr. Strange’s mouth was, “You’re not in trouble, get some blood back in that face.”

Peter laughed and rubbed at his cheek, which was growing hot under his fingertips. “Sorry. What did you want to talk to me about?”

Strange turned to the podium and picked up a manilla envelope. It looked thick and heavy, and it felt full when Strange handed it off to him, all but forcibly shoving the papers into Peter’s hands. The flap was folded into the envelope, adhesive unactivated. Peter didn’t get a chance to open it and look at its contents.

“You’re holding an application for a teaching assistant position,” Strange explained, gesturing towards the envelope, “for Mr. Stark’s Intro to Quantum Physics class. You and another student will be in charge of leading labs, as well as aiding Stark in grading papers and monitoring exams, and you’ll be getting paid by the university.”

Peter’s mouth gaped. A teaching position? A _paying_ teaching position? It was an assisting position, but _still_.

“I haven’t taken his class,” Peter said, immediately feeling like an idiot when Strange cocked an eyebrow at him. “Isn’t that one of the requirements?”

“Sure, but your transcript showed that you had taken the 101 class during dual enrollment and passed with flying colors.” Strange began gathering his papers together.

“I lit a lab table on fire.”

“That, you did. But I’m going to let you in on a little secret, Mr. Parker.” Strange gave him a pointed look, almost like he was annoyed with his attempts at refusal. “You’re not the first, the second, or even the last student to do as much. Sure, your fire was impressive in size, but your grades and initiative in high school speak louder than a chemical fire in this department.”

Peter’s fingers tightened around the envelope, eyes glancing between it and Dr. Strange. A TA position would look great on his resume, and the fact that Dr. Strange himself had gone out of his way to get an application for him was… Well, his ego certainly liked it. 

He must have been smiling, but Strange mirrored it with a small one of his own. “Are you going to apply?”

“Yeah, I think I will.” Peter tucked the envelope beneath his arm. 

“Good” Strange nodded towards the envelope. “You already have your required recommendation letter in there from me. I don’t want that going to waste. Return that to me before finals week, and I’ll personally make sure Professor Stark gets it.”

Peter nearly choked as he sputtered out a _thanks_ and left the lecture hall while Strange shooed him out. Professor Stark was one of the university’s best teachers, was loved by nearly the entire student population, and a TA position with him was highly sought-after by his classmates. He recalled a female classmate mentioning it to her friend just before Strange’s lecture, about how much she wanted to get accepted for the position.

And _Dr. Strange_, of all people, had given him a recommendation letter for it. He didn’t think he could get his head wrapped around that. Peter would sign the application at home once he had finished his assignments and return it to Dr. Strange at the next lecture. His heart pounded with excitement, pride, nerves. 

He was just giddy enough to do something he’d been putting off for a little too long.

—

The hold music in his ear made him feel far sicker than the hangover from Sunday, and Peter was battling the urge to vomit onto his comforter while he listened to the ringing. What was he going to say to the man when he picked up?

_Hey, sorry for drunkenly calling you and also trying to FaceTime, now that I remember things clearly. Completely inappropriate, especially in a client-service-type relationship like what we have. Not that we _have_ a relationship, or anything. Or, we do, but it’s not, like, romantic._

Even in practiced mental scenarios he was an idiot.

Still, he listened to the cheesy saxophone blaring in his ear and tried not to hum along to the tune he had practically memorized by now. Jeez, they needed an updated soundtrack. Nothing got him less in the mood than stereotypical porno music. Not that he was in the mood. He just wanted to talk, to apologize.

Make amends with his Daddy. 

Finally, after what felt like an hour of _PornHub’s Greatest Hits_, Tony picked up.

“Well, there’s someone I wasn’t expecting to hear from today,” came that comforting voice on the other end. Even through a spike of nerves, Peter could feel a calming warmth ebb its way over his skin. “How are you feeling, Petey? Was the hangover as bad as I had warned you?”

Peter didn’t remember Tony telling him anything about the hangover, but then again, he didn’t really remember much about his drunken booty call. The context of waking up with a pillow shoved between his legs was enough for him to go on.

“I don’t remember that,” he answered honestly, voice weaker and laced with more mortification than he had expected. Tony wasn’t even talking like his Daddy, but he still felt like he was being reprimanded. “But that hangover was awful. I’m never drinking again.”

Tony’s laugh was a blessing, and Peter closed his eyes to tune into it.

“You’ll drink again, you’ll just know not to accept a rematch when you lose at beer pong.” There was shuffling in the background. Peter wondered what he was doing, thought briefly of asking him as such. “Or, you know, play beer pong at all at your age. Your alcohol tolerance isn’t quite there, and also, it’s illegal.”

Peter snorted. “I know I get off to calling you Daddy, but hearing you lecture me like an actual parent is not as hot.”

Tony laughed again, and Peter realized he could fall in love with that sound. 

“You’re as much of a brat sober as you are when you’re horny.”

It was Peter’s turn to laugh, and he ducked his head with a shy smile, despite not being within Tony’s sight. Heat spread out across his cheeks and neck. “Um, speaking of sobriety—”

“Don’t even worry about it, kid. It’s not the first time someone’s drunk dialed me.”

“Yeah, but,” Peter started, swallowing through his pride. His throat felt tight, a different shade of embarrassment creeping up on him, “it was, uh, really, really stupid. And probably disrespectful. And, uh, embarrassing for me, so please just let me apologize, if nothing else than for my pride.”

“Okay, okay, apology accepted.” Tony paused, and Peter liked to think he was taking a drink. “So, are you looking for a good time, baby boy? I don’t have any calls lined up.”

Peter thought about it. May wasn’t home from work yet, he already had Tony on the phone, and now would have been an excellent time to get himself off. He chewed on his lip. Whatever homework he had tonight could wait. He was confident enough in his study habits that putting off his last-minute reviews for his exams wouldn’t threaten his GPA.

So he undid the button of his jeans and let down his zipper, already feeling himself twitch in anticipation.

“Any time with you is good, _Daddy_,” he purred, and Tony’s answering groan sent sparks across his skin. Fuck, it felt so good, even better since he was sober. Why his drunken self thought he was going to get the real deal was beyond him.

“You know just what to say to get me started, baby boy.” Tony’s voice was a deep growl, one that kickstarted Peter’s heartbeat. “I’d love to treat you right tonight, but you never did go through with your punishment.”

“Remind me again.” Peter slipped his hand down his front, groping and kneading himself while he rolled his hips over the curve of his palm. What he wouldn’t give to have it be Tony’s hand. “Wanna be good for you.”

“You’re always good for me, baby. If you’re good for me tonight, I’ll get you off real nice.” Peter whimpered, stroking himself through his underwear. Tony tsked in his ear. “I believe I told you not to touch yourself that night, Peter. Daddy’s the only one who gets to play with your cock tonight.”

Peter’s hand shook when he pulled it all too reluctantly from the front of his jeans and fisted it in his comforter. The shift in Tony’s tone, how _possessive_ he sounded… His throat became unusually tight, constricting. Every ounce of fight in him melted away. He could do nothing but whine in response to Tony’s command and resist the urge to rut down against his mattress.

Tony chuckled in his ear.

“Are you following directions, baby boy?” Tony asked, and Peter just hummed out a weak _mm-hm_. “Good boy, Pete. Following orders, so obedient. What did I do to deserve such a good boy?”

Peter’s head felt light, like it was full of air. His cock drooled into his underwear, a dark wet patch slowly and steadily growing. He wanted to touch himself. He wanted to touch himself so badly, and his hand was cramping where it was tangled in his blankets. The whimper that eked out of him was pathetic even to his own ears.

“What’s wrong, Petey? Does it hurt? Do you want Daddy to touch you?” Tony teased. Peter wanted to curse him but grit his teeth. “Daddy has something he wants to hear from you, baby. What do you say when you’re bad?”

Peter sobbed. “M’sorry, Daddy.” He resisted the urge to grope himself again, but laid down so his face pressed against the mattress and rolled his hips into his sheets. Tears of arousal, of frustration, built up and clumped into his eyelashes. “I’ll be good, do what you say. I promise.”

“I know you will.” 

Peter whined and ground down against his bed again. Every muscle in his body was wound tight, heat rolling through him in waves, his head spinning from sheer arousal. God, what he wouldn’t give to have Tony’s hands on him. He could imagine larger, stronger hands than his holding him down, stroking his aching dick, pressing in to open him up—

He keened, high and needy, and Tony cooed at him through the speaker.

“I know, baby boy, but if you want to be good, you have to go through with your punishment,” Tony said, much to Peter’s wordless protest. “Take your pants off and put your pillow between your legs, baby. You remember what I had you do?”

Peter didn’t, but he had a really good idea, considering the way he had woken up that following morning. He shed his jeans and clamped the pillow hard between his thighs, sighing with the split-second relief it provided him through the thin tent of his boxers. He was so hard it hurt, the ache reaching all the way to his toes curled up into his mattress, and when he rolled his hips against the plush edge of the pillow he moaned.

Tony answered him in kind, a deep and rumbling sound that sent lightning down Peter’s spine. Fuck, was he really touching himself? Peter had thought about it, hoped for it, even fantasized about Tony jerking his cock to whatever lecherous display Peter was performing for him. Did he get off to hearing Peter moan his name, call him Daddy, _beg for him_?

He chewed his lip and ground harder against the pillow.

“Daddy,” he moaned as his cock throbbed and leaked into his underwear.

“Yeah, baby?” Tony answered.

“A-Are you—” Peter choked off on a moan, using a hand to pull the pillow closer against his cock “—Are you touching yourself? Do you feel good, too?”

Tony said nothing. Peter worried he had overstepped a line. Was that possible, with sexline operators? Even with the weeks spent getting off with Tony, Peter wasn’t entirely knowledgeable about how they, well, operated. Regret over asking overtook his pleasure for a second, just a split second, before he heard Tony hiss and moan in his ear.

“Fuck,” Tony growled. “Yeah, my sweet boy. You get me so goddamn _hard_, you know that? I can’t fucking think straight when you call; got me so worked up a cold shower doesn’t even help me. Can’t stop thinking about how pretty you’d look with my cum on your face.”

Peter buried his face in his mattress to suppress the sob that tore from him. Tony was getting off with him, fantasizing about _him_. That fact was too much for Peter, arousal spiking low in his gut. He hissed and rutted harder against his pillow.

“Oh, Daddy.” Peter’s knuckles turned white where they were curled into the pillow’s edge. He whined and rolled his hips harder, faster. “Daddy, Daddy _please_, I want to come. Let me come, let me, please!”

Tony made a noise deep in his throat. “You’ve been so good today, sweet boy, you can come. Daddy wants to hear you come on yourself.”

Peter pulled his face from the mattress, mouth open, unabashed moans spilling out over his lips as the pressure between his hips built and built. He was ready to burst, tears burning in his eyes, and Tony’s unending praise in his ear brought him over the edge. He came hard and hot into his underwear, hips stuttering, Tony’s name on his lips. Peter rode it out, whining and babbling a stream of _thank you, thank you, oh Daddy, thank you_!

There was blood rushing through his ears and Peter’s pulse was so loud that he barely heard Tony’s groan. It was a heavy sound in his hear followed by laborious breaths. Peter wet his lips with his tongue and pushed himself up with shaking arms.

“Tony?” he asked, sounding as though he had run a marathon.

“Oh, fuck, baby,” Tony said, and there was a hiss, like he was breathing through clenched teeth. “Fuck, I just…”

_Oh_, said the little voice in Peter’s head. _Oh my god_.

Peter swallowed while his brain ran through the last few minutes at top speed. His heart jumped into his throat at Tony’s sudden laugh. “Oh, my god. Baby, you just made me come. Fuck, I’ve never— I don’t come during calls. I barely get hard, and you just… Shit.”

Peter’s lips pulled into a grin at the surprise in Tony’s voice, his own laugh coming out breathless. Should that have filled him with as much pride as it did?

“So, you really were touching yourself?” Peter asked. Tony huffed.

“Yeah, I was. Have been. Baby, you don’t even know what you do to me.” 

Peter’s cock, soft from release, stirred. He put a hand over himself to stave it off. He really didn’t have the energy to deal with it again if he got hard. But the knowledge that Tony had been getting off to their sessions with Peter, touching himself even without coming, sparked something in Peter’s chest. He chewed on his cheek and thought.

“I probably need a shower,” Peter said eventually, hating to end their call so soon. “I, um, I’m kind of gross right now.”

“I highly doubt that. Sloppy, maybe. Gross? Never.” Dammit, even post-orgasm, Tony was still as suave and smooth as ever. He didn’t even sound like he had been taken for a ride, not the way Peter did. Peter knew he sounded wrecked and hoped Tony knew that it was because of him. “Still, you should wash up. Don’t let this lecherous old man dirty you any more than you deserve to be.”

“Nothing you do is too dirty for me, Daddy.”

“Mm, that’s my boy.”

Peter laughed and waited until Tony gave him a sweet, affectionate good night to hang up. His hand dropped to the mattress with his phone, and he stared at the bright screen until it eventually faded to black. Knowing that Tony was just as hot and bothered when Peter called was exhilarating; it made Peter so happy he flopped back onto the bed, turned his face into his blankets, and happily kicked his mattress until the burst of energy faded. With it, though, faded his little fantasy of his relationship with Tony.

Which, he reminded himself, wasn’t a relationship.

He didn’t let the thought linger for too long. The application was still sitting on his desk in its envelope, and if Peter was really going after that teaching position, he needed to fill it out and have it ready for Dr. Strange within the next few weeks. As long as Professor Stark didn’t ask him for details about the accidental fire, Peter supposed he had a fighting chance.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in all honesty, y’all, i doubt this would exist if quellthefire hadn’t quiet literally sat down and talked the whole damn thing out with me. i adore her to pieces, y’all don’t even understand. so much love. <3<3
> 
> due to the tone i wanted to keep for this chapter, there’s no smut. i’ll be making up for that in the following chapter(s). i’m only planning one, possibly two more parts after this one, depending on what will be happening next. thank you to everyone for being patient with me and supporting my writing! i honestly couldn’t do this without y’all.

Tony had to admit: the two applications sitting on his desk were very impressive. He really wished that he had been able to interview the candidates himself before the end of the semester, maybe gotten to know the students before deciding to bring them on. He had promised to speak at a conference that same week, however, and Bruce and Pepper had strongarmed him into following through with it.

That had left his department head, Dr. Bruce Banner, with the pleasure of sifting through and interviewing the students that applied for the position, and Tony was confident in his friend’s decisions. He trusted that Bruce had brought in the brightest of his applicants.

Plus, one of them had managed to snag a recommendation letter from Stephen Strange himself. Even Tony knew that Stephen’s word carried significant weight amongst the faculty. Tony would have been an idiot to say no to this kid.

The other one was making a name for himself as well. Tony would have to talk to him about his social media addiction, though. Unless authorized, Tony was a stickler for the “no phones during lab hours” rule. He especially enforced it for his TAs, since they would be spending most of their time with students running lab experiments.

He sent emails out to the two students later that morning, asking for them to meet with him around 2 PM the next day in the lab to discuss the next semester’s lesson plan. He’d teach them to clean and test the equipment they’d be using, maybe run through a few of the experiments for fun. They’d have to familiarize themselves with the lessons they’d be teaching, and he supposed that the fact that the two of them went to the same high school would make things easier when it came to collaborating.

Flash Thompson gave him a very cool and calm response that he would be there  _ early _ to meet him. Peter Parker apologized profusely for the fact that he would be late due to one of his classes running until 2:15. Tony told him it wouldn’t be a problem and that they’d wait for him.

And wait he certainly did. After his 1:30 lecture, Tony gathered his papers and headed off towards the lab to set things up. Electron spin resonance sounded like a good warm up. Maybe he’d have them go over the experiment together and then work on how they could teach it while Tony pretended to be a clueless student. It would give him the opportunity to ask the dumb questions he got in class regularly.

He was already making a mental list of what they would need for the experiment on his walk to the other side of the building. Maybe they would have time to write up a lab report, as well. He’d like to see his new assistants break down the experiment so they would know what Tony was expecting from his students.

Tony cleared off a table from that morning’s lab work to set his things down, then set to work pulling out the equipment Peter and Flash would need. One of his current TAs had left their lab workbook on the desk. Tony took advantage of that fact and began flipping through until he found the experiment page he needed.

He didn’t hear the door open or close while reading, but he did hear the following cough meant to get his attention.

A young man, obviously a student, grinned up at him. “Professor Stark, right?”

“You’re early,” Tony said. “You must be Flash Thompson.”

“I am! And if I may, I really appreciate the opportunity to work with you! I’m so excited to start working next semester with my partner,” Flash said while setting his backpack down. Tony could hear the insincerity in his voice but brushed it off.  


“I’ll write whatever letter you need to get into your graduate program, if that’s what you’re wanting from me. Just don’t lose my email and we’re good.” Tony found his experiment page and grabbed up a marker for the whiteboard. “You and your partner are going to go over an experiment together, pretend you’re teaching it to a student who’s never done it.”

“Can do.”  


Tony gave his first TA a wry smile and went back to the board.  


He spent the next half hour swapping between writing down the experiment parameters and answering Flash’s questions about what was expected of him.  _ Yes _ , Tony was going to require him to teach a recitation or two every week.  _ Yes _ , he would have to spend a few hours in Tony’s office grading tests and reading lab reports in order to help Tony get grades out on time.  _ No _ , Flash was not allowed to fire his other TA if he didn’t like them.

Tony had a slight headache behind his eyes by the time the lab door opened, and his second TA burst into the room.

“I’m sorry I’m late! My class just got out, and the professor wanted me to stay behind to ask—”

There was silence while Tony finished writing down the last part of the instructions, and he was startled by a loud laugh from behind him.

“Penis Parker? Holy shit.” Tony turned around to look at him, but Flash didn’t seem to notice, all of his attention on Peter as he shut the door behind him. “How did you manage to get here after your stunt in chem? I don’t think this place has enough fire extinguishers to handle you.”

Tony rolled his eyes.  


“Of course you’re here, Flash,” Peter said, voice tight as if he had accepted his lot. There was the dull  _ thunk _ of a backpack being plopped onto one of the thick wooden tables lined up in the center of the room. “Why did I bother thinking literally anyone else would get the position?”

Tony capped his marker. “Okay, children, please learn how to get along. Remember that this is a  _ paying _ job, so name-calling and insulting each other will result in—”

Tony turned while he was speaking, flipping the marker in his hands, and stopped.

There was no possible way. The universe had to be playing tricks on him.

A pair of bambi-brown eyes stared back at him, narrowed in confusion as to why Tony had stopped himself mid-sentence and was staring at him with his mouth open like a goddamn goldfish. Tony wanted to slap himself, to startle awake from whatever dream he was currently in. Part of him wished he would look down and find himself in his underwear or with three legs to confirm he was dreaming.

Tony would know that face anywhere, had seen it contorted and scrunched up in drunken desire to get off. He had heard that voice pitched so high it was mostly air, and had listened, completely enraptured, to the boy who owned it while he recounted his day or begged his Daddy for more.  


_ Holy shit _ , he thought and tried not to flub over his words when Flash asked him what was wrong.

His baby boy, his Peter, was here. Not just in the same city, but in the  _ same fucking room _ . Tony nearly snapped the marker in his grip in half.

“Nice of you to finally join us, Mr. Parker,” he said. He knew he hadn’t been able to recover from his stunned silence by the way both boys’ faces scrunched up in confusion. They shared a look between them, feud momentarily forgotten. “As I was saying, this is a job. The university is paying you to act professional, so please learn how to get along.”

“Yeah, Penis, don’t be a dick,” Flash said, jerking his elbow into Peter’s arm. Peter rubbed his arm and rolled his eyes.

Tony grit his teeth together. Oh, that wasn’t going to fly.

The dry erase marker hit Flash dead in the forehead. Both boys jumped in their seats, and Flash’s hand flew up to where the marker had bounced off his forehead. He looked to where it landed at his feet and then up to Tony.

“What the hell? Did you just throw that at me?”

“Oh, I’m sorry, are we not children?” Tony asked. “You’re not being paid to call each other names and be little assholes. You might have been some bigshot in high school, but as long as you’re on the university’s payroll, you’re going to act like an adult and treat each other with respect. That goes for both of you, am I understood?”

Tony’s eyes barely flicked to Peter as both boys nodded and gave him very embarrassed  _ Yes sir _ s. Once he had his answer, Tony stepped up to Flash and held his hand up. He curled his fingers in and said, “Give me my marker, please. I need to finish writing this experiment down. You two are going to pretend I’m a student and walk me through it as though I’ve never seen it before. And  _ work together _ . Like professionals, please.”

Whatever Flash’s reaction was to his demand, Tony didn’t see it. Instead, his eyes were focused solely on the way Peter stared at him, lip pinched between his teeth just for a moment, before reaching for his backpack and pulling out a notebook.

—

Stephen Strange didn’t so much as flinch when Tony stormed into his office and slammed a thick manilla envelope down in front of him. Strange’s eyes were focused instead on his computer monitor, tapping away at his keyboard without acknowledging Tony’s presence. Tony pushed it over the keys, just to see his top lip curl just the slightest bit.

He sighed and looked to Tony with pursed lips. “Something you need, Professor Stark?”

“Yeah, actually,” Tony answered. He pushed the envelope further over the keyboard and took a step back. “That application, you can have it back. Send it to another teacher or burn it in a furnace, I don’t care. I’m not interested in having him.”

Strange picked it up and opened it, The first page of the TA application had his eyes narrowing. He looked offended, although he didn’t let his face give it away any further than pressing his lips into a tight line. He glared daggers over the top of the page.

“Any particular reason you’re rejecting my applicant so early in his employment, Tony?” Strange put the papers back in the envelope and put it gently down onto the desk. Tony knew he was seething by the way he gently and carefully interlocked his fingers and tilted his head.  


Tony wasn’t afraid of him. Mostly.

“Yeah, just one: he’s not gonna work out.” Tony shrugged, tried to keep his tone even and casual. “We ran through a lab experiment today and he barely knows what he’s doing.”

“Oh, I doubt that. The kid’s brilliant and a quick learner.” Strange gave the envelope a small nudge in Tony’s direction.

“You’ve been wrong before, Stephen.” Tony turned his back to him. “I appreciate the help, but I’m going to take a look at other applicants and see who else I can bring on, preferably interviewing them myself.”

Strange scoffed. “You’re a terrible bullshitter, Tony.”

“I have no idea what you mean.”

Strange rolled his eyes, but Tony turned back to him. He had taken the envelope into his hands, securing the clasp so the flap was closed, and waved it like a flag. “Is there a reason you could get into trouble if you went into next semester as his supervisor?”

Tony answered a little too quickly. “No.”

Strange groaned and let the envelope slap against the surface of his desk. He rubbed at his eyes and leaned back into his chair. It squeaked, an old thing that should probably be replaced soon. Whatever he had been doing on his computer before was now pushed aside in favor of Tony’s current debacle. Strange groaned and mumbled something that Tony couldn’t hear.

“How long has this been going on, Tony?” Strange asked, and Tony rolled his eyes.

“It’s not like that,” he shot back. “At least, not the way you think.”

Stephen looked up at him, fingers just inches from his eyes. His brow cocked high, frowning. Tony loved his friend, really he did, but the look he wore on his face whenever Tony did or said something he disapproved of made him feel like he was twelve years old and standing in front of his father again.  


“Explain it to me, then,” Strange said, nodding to one of the seats across from his desk.  


Tony didn’t sit down like Strange wanted, but he put his hands on the back of one of the chairs and leaned against it. The faux leather wrinkled under his touch when he dug his fingers into the back cushion.

“Okay, you’re not allowed to judge me for this. We were friends back during undergrad. That means I’ve seen all your weird pre-doctorate shit.” Strange’s expression didn’t change. Tony continued, “So, I may or may not have a side-gig I do at home. I’m, uh. I work for a sex hotline.”

Both brows shot up. “That’s tamer than I was expecting.”

“I don’t want to know what you were thinking.” Tony sighed. “The kid you recommended is a regular caller. Like, real regular. So regular that sometimes he just wants to talk to me about my fucking day, and I let him.” He didn’t miss the quiet expletive from Strange. “Isn’t this university against sexual relations with its students?”

The look Strange fixed him with could have killed.  


“ _ Tony _ .”

“Take your recommendation back. Sorry to bruise your ego, but I don’t think I can do this. I’d be risking my job.”

“Oh, please,” Strange snapped with a roll of his eyes. “You’re not thinking about your job here. You’re prioritizing a sexual relationship with a student over giving them opportunities. You’d rather sleep with him than watch him succeed within the university.”

“There’s no ‘sleeping with’ involved—”

“Semantics don’t matter to HR. If they hear about this, all that’s going to matter to them is the fact that you were sexually involved with a student, unknowingly or not!” Strange stood from his desk and rounded it to shove the envelope against his chest. Tony took a step back from the force of it, hands flying up to catch the envelope before it fell to the floor.  


“A student this bright, with this many accomplishments, and with  _ my _ recommendation isn’t going to get rejected so easily. Your department head interviewed him himself, and if he finds out you kicked Parker out after one day of training, he’ll start asking questions,” Strange said sharply, his finger jabbing Tony’s chest. “Good luck lying to Banner, too, because he’ll sniff this out faster than I did.”

Tony looked down to the envelope in his hands while Strange returned to his desk and whatever task he had previously been working on. Strange fixed his hands back over his keyboard and then looked back at Tony.

“Don’t prioritize a sexual relationship over this kid’s future, Tony. Think about  _ him _ for a minute.” Strange nodded to the envelope. “When I’m less furious with you, I’ll be asking questions about that hotline of yours. I’m curious.”

Tony let out a heavy sigh and tried not to hang his head when he left Strange’s office. As infuriating as he was, Tony had to admit that his friend was right. He should have cut the kid off as a patron and pretended like none of it ever happened.

But even with that knowledge, when Tony retreated to his office, he sent an email to Peter Parker thanking him for his interest in the position and for his time in the lab, but that he was no longer interested in having him return for continuous training. Might as well save his own ass, cover his bases. It would be best for both of them, he thought.  


Maybe he’d send Strange’s recommendation letter to the kid and encourage him to find another on-campus job using it. There wasn’t a teacher on faculty that would turn their nose up at a student with Stephen Strange’s seal of approval.

Strange wouldn’t appreciate his advice being ignored, but it was certainly better than the alternative. For himself, Tony knew. At least he wouldn’t have to see the kid’s reaction to his rejection.

—

Unfortunately for Tony, Peter was a very attentive and responsive student.  


He had a reply to his email before he had arrived home that night, but he waited until he was about two glasses in before getting the courage to open it. As expected, Peter was questioning what he had done wrong on day one of training to warrant losing the position. He apologized profusely for getting into it with Flash, for any act that came off as unprofessional, and even for the chemical fire from earlier in the semester that might have had something to do with his termination.

Tony had heard of that fire in passing. He’d been impressed with it.  


His stomach twisted in knots as he read and reread the desperate part of the email begging for Tony to reconsider terminating him and give him another chance. He closed it out and set his phone aside. The whiskey in his glass didn’t taste nearly as good as it had the night before when he swallowed it down.  


He deleted it instead of responding. Tony wasn’t sure what to tell him.

_ We fuck on the phone, and that’s a big no-no in University rules. Can’t be helped. _

_ Oh, turns out that I’m a bastard who doesn’t want to lose his job, so I’m firing _ you _ to keep the dean from firing  _ me _ . _

Each reason he thought of made him cringe and want to crawl up under his coffee table. He was just as tired with himself as Strange had been earlier that day, jabbing his finger into Tony’s chest like a knife while lecturing him.

Tony returned to his couch with his refilled glass only to find his phone ringing. Peter’s number flashed on the screen. His stomach did flips as he picked his phone up and stared at the number, thumb hovering over the green answer button out of instinct. He had saved the number in his phone after the fifth call; a taboo, but he couldn’t resist the slight tingle of excitement that came over him when he saw Peter’s number flash on the screen, accompanied by the name  _ Baby Boy _ .  


Tonight, there was no excitement in seeing his boy’s number. Nothing but dread filled him.

He moved his hand and denied the call. The phone went silent and the screen faded to black. Tony set it down onto the coffee table and watched it, something inside him hoping Peter would call again.

Peter did, just a few moments later.  


Tony didn’t let it reach a third ring before he shut it off entirely and retired for the night.

—

Tony was grateful for the finals review his students begged him for. A cumulative three-hour lecture, completely optional, helped him keep his mind off things. He let his mind be carried away in the stream of seemingly-endless questions from them, the sound of pencils and pens scratching on paper, and keys clicking on laptops as they took notes as quickly as they could.

He even appreciated the one student recording his overview on her phone at the very front. She promised to send him a copy of the file for his online blackboard so other students could make use of it in the following semesters. She gave him a gleeful smile when he told her she’d be getting extra credit for it.

Flash was already bothering him about another training for the position, emails as meticulously worded as ever. Tony refrained from telling him about Peter’s termination earlier that week, not wanting to hear him brag or make a snide comment about being the last man standing.

A slew of questions kept him another forty minutes after the initial three hours, answering and drawing out explanations across the whiteboard for the students whose majors rode on passing his class. He accepted a late application for his now-open TA position and said he would get back to them when he could.  


His office was a small reprieve from the hustle and bustle of the semester coming to a close. He had already dealt with his failing students, his students asking about where to go next with their core classes, as well as scholarship students looking for opportunities within his department. His head was damn near spinning off his shoulders when the last student left, and he had time to go through his notes and presentations for the next semester.

So he thought.

He was busy reassessing his notes on the Casimir effect for his 202 class when he heard a quick knock on his door. Tony didn’t bother looking up from his screen and called them in.

“I’ll be with you in a moment,” he said when he heard the door open. “I’m just finishing up some notes for next semester’s lectures.”

“Take your time. I’m not in a rush.”

Tony felt a cold chill take over him as his hands froze above his keyboard. He gathered enough courage to pull his eyes away from his monitor and—

Yes, it seemed the universe was still not acting in his favor.

Peter Parker stood in front of him, shuffling awkwardly from one foot to the other, but looking at Tony with hard eyes and lips pulled into a tight, thin line. He was breathing heavily but trying to hide it, like he had rushed over from one of his classes and he didn’t want Tony seeing how winded he was.

_ Shit. _

“Mr. Parker,” he started, sighing with resignation. No point in putting this off any longer. He gestured to one of the chairs facing his desk. “Have a seat, if you want.”

“I’m fine with stranding,” Peter said flatly. He stepped between the two seats, though, and crossed his arms. “If you still want to continue those notes, I’m willing to wait.”

Tony chuckled and shook his head. Damn brat.

“No, that can wait. Was there something you wanted to discuss with me?”

Peter’s eyes narrowed at that.

“Yes. Why did you fire me from the TA position?”

Tony figured he did a good enough job in masking his panic from Peter, continuing to hold eye contact and even leaning forward across his desk. He hoped his small shrug came off as casual to Peter.

“You weren’t what I wanted,” he said. “I’m looking for a specific set of credentials, and you just didn’t fit the bill. I do appreciate you stepping up and taking the position, but I’ll be going forward with someone else.”

“But you’re keeping Flash?” Peter scoffed. “What makes him more capable than me for the job? Our applications were practically identical.”

Tony fumbled. “Well, his grades—“

“Were lower than mine. We went to the same school and I graduated valedictorian.”

Shit. Tony remembered reading that on his application. “Well, Mr. Thompson is also a physics major. What experience he gains in this position can be applied to his other core classes in the future.”

“Dr. Banner told me that my major didn’t dictate whether or not I got the job, as long as I understood the material.” Peter took a step forward. “I also have reliable transportation, plenty of free time in the upcoming semester to assist you with papers and recitations,  _ and _ a recommendation from Dr. Strange, the head of the astronomy department, who encouraged me to go for the job.”

Tony tapped his fingers against his desk. This fucking kid. Not so submissive in his daily life, now was he.

“Why do you want this job so badly?” he asked, catching the boy by surprise if the way his brows climbed his face indicated. “I’ve fired students before who never fought so hard to come back. Why does this position mean so much?”  


Peter took a deep breath in through his nose and shuffled again. He couldn’t meet Tony’s eye now.

“I just want to help my aunt, Mr. Stark. I’m here on a full ride scholarship because that was the only way I could afford college without putting either of us in more debt than we already are. The money I would get from the university was going to go towards books and rent. Our landlord just raised it again, so we’re already struggling as it is.”

Tony’s chest hurt; he couldn’t help the visible wince he made at the mention of raised rent. And on top of the guilt of firing him, Tony didn’t want to think about the amount of money the boy had shelled out on their phone calls. It made him hurt enough to rub at the hard dip of his sternum.

Answering that late night phone call would have been leagues easier than this.

“ _ Please _ , Mr. Stark, just tell me what I did to make you second guess me, and I’ll change it. Give me something to tell my aunt when I go home tonight.”

Tony swallowed, throat tightening at the wetness he saw brimming in Peter’s eyes. The strength had left the boy’s voice by the time he talked about his family’s debt, leaving it cracking when he pleaded for a reason.Tony wondered if he hadn’t told his aunt he’d lost the job. Maybe he was hoping his demands would be met, and she wouldn’t ever have to know that his extra income had been on the line.  


“Sit down,” Tony said. He chewed on his cheek and looked up at Peter. The boy’s face had started to redden, out of frustration or embarrassment, and he was blinking rapidly.

“What?” Peter asked.

“Sit down.” Tony nodded towards the chair at Peter’s left. “You want me to tell you why I cut you loose, right?”

Peter scrambled to get himself into the cushion, fingers clutching the armrests so hard his nails turned white. “Yes, please, Mr. Stark. Give me a chance to prove I deserve the position, or a chance to learn what I need to know to keep it.”

His eagerness to please Tony would have been endearing if it didn’t make his chest ache. He took a deep breath and silently wished he had some booze stashed somewhere in his office to ease the fluttering in his stomach.

Tony cleared his throat.

“Okay, kitten. I can do that.”

One second passed, then two, as Peter’s face scrunched up. Then his eyes went wide.  


_ Ah _ , Tony thought,  _ there it is. _


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so, i’m guessing i’m in for an “ugh, finally” from a reader or two. i’ve been busy, gone through some very personal stuff over the last couple of months that made writing a near-impossible task for me. thankfully, i’ve mostly made it through. so sorry for such a long wait, my dears. i hope y’all enjoy.
> 
> also, much love to quellthefire for, well, pretty much everything over the past few weeks. she knows everything she’s done for me. it’s why i specifically waited for her to return from work to post this, lol.
> 
> i know it’s taken me way too long to get this part out, and a lot has happened since last september. sorry to make y’all wait. 
> 
> **Warnings:** Peter is 19. anxiety attacks, mentions of a student/teacher relationship. nothing nsfw here. saving that for later ;)

Peter read the email over and over again, heart pounding like an uncontrollable jackhammer, and willed it to be fake. Some part of him hoped that maybe Flash had gotten ahold of Professor Stark’s email, gone through his computer, and sent it to throw Peter off. The things Flash had done and said to him back in high school, Peter wouldn’t count Flash out of doing something so… cruel.

_Regret to inform you that your services as a teacher’s assistant will no longer be needed_, the words said, each letter like a knife in Peter’s chest. _Thank you for your interest in the position, but a more qualified candidate has been chosen to replace you. I’m sorry for any inconvenience this change causes…_

He couldn’t bring himself to read the rest. His blood went cold, even as his heart pounded so hard he briefly thought it would jump out of his ribcage. This couldn’t be happening. He could just close his eyes and count to three, and everything would be fixed, right? _Right_?

Peter hastily clicked out of the window and began pacing his room. He chewed on a nail until it broke. What was he going to do? What was he going to say? He had already told May he had an announcement to make at dinner; she was expecting something good, if the way she was humming and singing to herself in the kitchen was anything to go by. 

The last thing he needed to brag about was _losing_ the position.

His fingers were moving across his keyboard before he could properly think. Pulling up the email again, sending Professor Stark a reply filled with apologies for anything and everything he had done wrong, and refreshing the page four times within the span of two minutes. Hopefully, Professor Stark wasn’t one of those teachers who didn’t respond to their emails.

Peter paced his room and refreshed the page until May’s voice finally floated in through his doorway, “Dinner’s ready, Pete! I don’t think I burned it this time.”

Peter’s heart jumped into his throat. He’d have to tell her.

The smell of definitely-burnt meatloaf clung to Peter’s nostrils when he entered the kitchen, a hazy, smokey fog hanging over the apartment. May stood at one of the windows in the living room and used a copy of _The Daily Bugle_ to waft it out into the night. She brushed her dark hair out of her face with her free hand and offered him a weak, guilty smile.

“Okay, I lied. It’s a little charred. But I won’t be offended if you want to scrape off the black bits.”

Peter offered her a weak chuckle and went to set the table. He nervously ran his thumb over a chip in one of the plates while May abandoned her task of fanning out the smoke, but she left the window open. A gentle breeze and the smell of Queens at night joined them at the dinner table.

The meatloaf was dry and tough, but the vegetables she had cooked to go along with it were nearly perfect. She did tease him about how much salt he put over them before she took a sip of her water and cleared her throat. “So,” she started, and Peter didn’t feel very hungry anymore. “What was your big announcement? I’ve been dying all day, since you texted me at lunch.”

_At lunch, I still had a job_, he thought bitterly, buying some time for himself by chewing thoughtfully on a stalk of broccoli. 

“Oh, yeah.” Peter swallowed and, wow, his tongue was ridiculously dry. Had he put too much salt on his food this time? No, he hadn’t, but he liked to think that it wasn’t his fear and anxiety making his tongue stick to the roof of his mouth. “It’s, um, it’s not—”

“Is everything okay?” May asked, and the concern in her voice made his chest ache. “I know finals are coming up. Are you doing okay in your classes? Do you need help? You know, we have that retired chemist upstairs; I’m sure she wouldn’t mind tutoring you if I baked her a pan of my walnut brownies. She was asking for some the other day.”

“No! No, I’m doing fine in my classes. My astronomy teacher actually made me exempt from taking the exam because I have the highest grade in the class.” Peter’s teeth dug into his cheek. “May, it’s about the teaching assistant job.”

“The what?” May perked up, eyebrows rising to her hairline. “What job? When did you apply?”

“Didn’t I tell you?” May shook her head, food forgotten, completely entranced by Peter’s next words. “Oh, um, the teacher of one of the dual enrollment classes I took in high school was hiring a couple of assistants for next year. I applied for it.”

Her face lit up; Peter could see the excitement in her eyes. His stomach dropped even further as she leaned in with a grin.

“Did you get it? You got it, didn’t you? Wait, when did you even apply? Why didn’t you tell me you were applying?” she asked. Each question came so quickly Peter didn’t have time to answer. She was practically vibrating in her seat.

_Fuck. _

What was he supposed to say to that?

“I, um, I did my first training for it today,” he offered. 

It wasn’t a complete lie, not a lie at all, but it still didn’t feel right watching May cheer and jump from the table so forcefully that she knocked her chair over. She didn’t seem bothered about disturbing the neighbors with the noise. May rushed around the table and threw her arms around his shoulders. Her kiss to his cheek was met with no protest.

“Oh my god, I’m so proud of you! Did you enjoy it? Does it pay?” she asked, and quickly followed it up with: “Oh, that doesn’t matter. What matters is that you enjoy it. And that it doesn’t get in the way of your school work.”

Peter just nodded as she kissed his cheek again and ruffled his hair. “We have to celebrate! Oh, I have moose tracks ice cream in the fridge! Bought it on a whim. What excellent timing, though!”

May didn’t seem to notice the strain in his smile as she placed a noisy kiss to his forehead and abandoned her half-eaten loaf for fetching the ice cream from the fridge. Peter let the smile drop from his face the moment she was back in the kitchen, twisting his fork on his plate, a piece of tough and overcooked meat speared on the end of it. His appetite, already struggling, made itself non-existent now.

He had to do something to save himself the embarrassment of owning up to May. He couldn’t disappoint her, not with how excited she was, and how she politely (and, almost embarrassed) asked him to assist with rent.

The cherry on top of his horrendous night was calling Tony, hoping maybe he could distract himself or ask for a fitting punishment, one of the ones Tony dolled out when Peter really wanted him to be mean. His first call was cut short, barely making it to the third ring before an automated voice told him his call couldn’t be completed.

He tried again, hands shaking, heart jumping into his throat, hoping the operator on the other end wouldn’t judge or laugh at his desperation. She was monotonous as ever, but that didn’t stop his mind from supplying every little possible laugh and mocking word she would have said once he was no longer within earshot.

Waiting for Tony to pick up his second call was even more nerve-racking than the first time, and the rejection hurt that much more. He didn’t bother listening to the message again, shutting his phone off and tossing it to the end of the bed.

Peter’s eyes stung and the back of his throat ached. 

He pretended to be content when he forced himself under the covers, hiding his face as he went to sleep with damp cheeks. 

—

Peter had spent his entire morning building up the courage to confront Professor Stark. He had barely managed to focus enough on his psychology professor’s lecture to take decent notes, couldn’t eat due to the anxious churn in his stomach making him sick, and had to calm himself down from the edge of not one, but two meltdowns in one of the bathrooms in the social sciences building. 

He needed to do this. Not just for him, but for May, for both of them to be able to stay afloat.

The landlord just raised their rent. He couldn’t afford to be passed over for the position.

So he struggled with his focus on classes, managed to avoid setting another fire in a chemistry lab for the second time that semester, and somehow didn’t drive himself completely insane. His leg bounced like he had four springs embedded into his heel during the last twenty minutes of his biochem class before they were dismissed, and he was the first student out the door.

He had practiced what he was going to say, his arguments on why Professor Stark needed to keep him, planned to cover any lingering doubts in his abilities. Sure, he only took the 101 lecture, but he was a quick learner. He could still assist with other lectures, if given the chance to study them beforehand.

And catching the older man off guard in his office played well in his favor, until Professor Stark gestured to one of the chairs Peter stood between and told him plainly, “Sit down.”

His argument, his perfect defense of himself, was shattered. Peter blinked, mind still trying to catch up with the sudden halt of his thought process. “What?”

With a nod to a specific chair, Professor Stark continued, “Sit. You want me to tell you why I cut you loose, right?”

Peter practically threw himself into the chair, flubbing over his, _Yes, Mr. Stark_. This is what he needed, to know where he went wrong, know what he needed to improve on. If it meant going home with six of Stark’s textbooks or a bruised ego because of the man’s infamous harshness, Peter was fine with that. He could take a shot to his ego.

He expected a little criticism.

What he didn’t expect was Professor Stark to clear his throat, lean over his desk, and fix him with a smirk before saying, “Okay, kitten. I can do that.”

Peter’s brain grinded to a violent halt. The words registered. His brain still refused to process them. 

His first thought, once he could actually think, was _That’s inappropriate._

Peter’s face pinched together with a mix of confusion and distaste. He’d heard horror stories of college professors who wanted sex in exchange for perfect grades, or internships, or anything else a student might need to progress academically. Mainly, he’d heard stories from female students, not male students. 

Maybe Professor Stark was one of _those_ teachers, and Peter had given him a bargaining chip by confessing just how serious his situation was. There was no way Peter was going to sleep his way into the position. He valued his _pride_ more than that.

Peter had already thought of running to his advisor and making a report of Stark’s coming onto him, when the voice ran through his head again. The words played on repeat, a familiarity clinging to his tone—

Peter’s heart dropped into his stomach. 

Tony’s smirk deepened, but there was no pleasure in it. Mirthful, he leaned back in his chair and rubbed at his trimmed goatee with one of his hands. The other drummed on the arm of his chair as he waited for Peter to say something.

Peter’s tongue stuck to the top of his mouth. Speaking was a struggle, but somehow he managed to work out a few words, “Oh, my god.”

Tony laughed. _His_ Tony. He looked… less than happy to see him. “You gotta understand the kind of predicament I’m in, yeah? This whole thing we started isn’t, well, _good_ for either of us now.”

Peter’s face burned; he was sure that Tony could see him turning red all the way down to his neck. 

He wished he could focus. He wished he could nod along and agree with everything Tony was saying, but God, it was so difficult to do any of that when he was staring Tony right in the face. All of the faces, the bodies, everything he had fantasized about when they weren’t talked could never have lived up to the man sitting in front of him. Even the grays in his hair were different; they lined his temples, as expected, but there were strands strewn about in the hair he had so carefully styled up and back.

And his voice was just as distracting as it was through a phone speaker.

Peter needed water. Was the A/C in Tony’s office broken?

“Um. Yeah,” he said, still slowly processing Tony’s words. How had he managed to work for the man earlier without getting distracted? Sure, the man’s voice had sounded familiar when he first heard it, but hearing the confirmation that he was _exactly_ Peter thought of when he was at home—

Home. Shit.

“But!” he started, nearly jumping from his seat. Tony started at his outburst, eyes wide and brows high on his forehead. “But, Dad- Um, Tony. Stark. Sir. _Professor_ Stark, please, I need this position. I’ll do whatever you want me to if it means keeping it.”

“Dangerous words in our current situation, kiddo.”

Peter scoffed. “It’s not like anyone knows.”

Tony clicked his tongue and grimaced. 

“Who?” Peter asked, the blush in his cheeks fading to white.

“Dr. Strange.”

“Shit.” Peter put his head in his hands, rubbing patterns into the back of his eyelids. That was exactly what he wanted to hear. Not like he had Dr. Strange’s class the next day, or the following week until finals. How was he going to look the man in the eye now?

He shook his head; he’d cross that bridge when he came to it. Tomorrow, at 10 AM.

“Is…” Peter paused. How would he word this? Slowly, he figured, as he started speaking again, “Is what we’re doing… Is that the reason you want to fire me?”

“Pretty much,” Tony answered with a nod. “There’s only so much tenure can save my ass from.”

Peter swallowed, pretended that the low dip in his stomach wasn’t there. Firing Peter to save himself. Suave, handsome, but an asshole. He sure knew how to pick them.

“So, let’s stop.” Tony’s brows rose again. “The whole, you know, phone thing. The relationship. Whatever you want to call it. I need the job more than I need, um, _that_.”

Silence. Tony stared at him, face now a blank slate, eyes boring into Peter. He wished he could tell what the older man was thinking, if for nothing but to ease his anxious, pounding heart. His face felt hotter still. He was pretty sure he was beginning to sweat. Tony should get his A/C checked. 

God, Peter wished he would speak already. The silence and scrutiny were killing him.

Tony’s hand came up to his goatee again, rubbing at his stubble and covering his mouth in the meat of his palm. 

“Sound logic,” he said. His hand dropped from his face with a shrug. There was another moment of silence as Tony chewed on his lip and seemed to ponder over Peter’s words. “You really want this job?”

Peter had to push his hair out of his eyes from nodding so vigorously. “Yes.”

Tony tapped his finger on his desk a few times. Peter half-considered leaping over it and demanding an answer. 

“…Fine. It’s yours. On one condition.” Tony held a finger out to him. “You _do not_ use this situation against me, in any capacity. I mean it, no extortion. I’ll fire you immediately.”

“Got it.” Peter nodded. He certainly wasn’t planning on it; it was the last thing he would ever tell anyone outside of their situation. He was dreading Strange’s next lecture. That was already exceeding the amount of people he wanted to know about them.

“Good. I look forward to working with you, Mr. Parker.”

Peter failed at hiding his grin, and he wanted nothing more than to reach across Tony’s— Professor Stark’s desk and throw his arms around his neck. The word Daddy almost slipped from his mouth again when saying his thanks. He caught himself, rushing out of the teacher’s office for his next class. He was already late, but he didn’t care.

He still had the job. At this moment, that was all that mattered to him.

—

Back in his office, Tony ran his fingers through his hair and sighed.

God, he was so fucked.

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me on tumblr as readysetstarker!


End file.
